2008 kholer et al. dom from alperujo medicago sativa

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Available online at www.sciencedirect.com Waste Management 28 (2008) 1423–1431 www.elsevier.com/locate/wasman Impact of DOM from composted ‘‘alperujo’’ on soil structure, AM fungi, microbial activity and growth of Medicago sativa ´ J. Kohler, G. Tortosa, J. Cegarra, F. Caravaca *, A. Roldan CSIC-Centro de Edafologıa y Biologıa Aplicada del Segura., Department of Soil and Water Conservation. P.O. Box 164, ´ ´ Campus de Espinardo, 30100 Murcia, Spain Accepted 17 May 2007 Available online 10 July 2007Abstract Water-soluble extracts from compost may represent an alternative nutrient and organic matter source for crop production under dripirrigation. Dissolved organic matter (DOM), extracted from composted ‘‘alperujo’’, the main by-product from the Spanish olive oilindustry, was applied to soil alone or in combination with either Glomus intraradices Schenck and Smith or a mixture of G. intraradices,Glomus deserticola (Trappe, Bloss. and Menge) and Glomus mosseae (Nicol and Gerd.) Gerd. and Trappe. Response measurementsincluded mycorrhizal colonisation, nutrient uptake and growth of Medicago sativa and microbiological and physical properties in therhizosphere. Dissolved organic matter was added to soil at concentrations of 0, 50, 100 or 300 mg C kgÀ1 substrate. During the fourmonths of the experiment, the plants were harvested three times. Both mycorrhizal inoculation treatments signiﬁcantly increased soilaggregate stability. Only the mycorrhizal inoculations increased microbial biomass C and protease and phosphatase activities anddecreased water-soluble C, particularly the mixture of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. At the third harvest, the greatest increase in growthof M. sativa was observed in the inoculated plants with shoot biomass being 38% greater than for plants grown in the soil amended withthe highest dose of DOM and 57% greater than for control plants. The addition of DOM was not suﬃcient to restore soil structure andmicrobial activity and did not aﬀect the mycorrhizal development of introduced populations of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, but,depending on the dose, its fertiliser eﬃciency for improving plant growth was apparent.Ó 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.1. Introduction enhance mineral uptake (particularly P) (Smith and Read, ´ 1997), tolerance to water-stress (Ruız-Lozano, 2003) and Biological and physical soil degradation cause a pro- soil aggregation (Caravaca et al., 2002). The identiﬁcationgressive decline in agricultural production. The natural of eﬃcient AM fungi is a prerequisite for carrying outroles of rhizosphere microorganisms have been margina- mycorrhizal technologies, since nutrient uptake and metab-lised due to high inputs of inorganic fertilisers, herbicides olism in mycorrhizal plants depend on the mycorrhizaland pesticides (Mader et al., 2002). Such farming practices ¨ ´n endophyte (Azco and Tobar, 1998). Likewise, the hostmay aﬀect both arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungal diver- plant response to diﬀerent AM fungi is highly dependentsity and their eﬀectiveness in the ecosystem containing on environmental conditions (Johnson et al., 1997).these endophytes (Jeﬀries and Barea, 2001). Arbuscular Inadequate management practices have led to a decreasemycorrhizal fungi form mutual associations with more in the levels of organic matter of agricultural soils of Med-than 80% of plant species, including agronomic plants iterranean regions, causing a loss of their fertility and qual-(Smith and Read, 1997). They are important determinants ity. The addition to soil of liquid organic materials, andof plant health and soil fertility because they are known to especially of organic substances extractable with alkaline solutions, has been proposed as an alternative nutrient * Corresponding author. Tel.: +34 968 396337; fax: +34 968 396213. and organic matter source for crop production under drip E-mail address: fcb@cebas.csic.es (F. Caravaca). irrigation (Ayuso et al., 1996). Dissolved organic matter0956-053X/$ - see front matter Ó 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.doi:10.1016/j.wasman.2007.05.008

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1424 J. Kohler et al. / Waste Management 28 (2008) 1423–1431(DOM) addition may have a positive eﬀect on plant supernatant was freed of particulate matter. The analyticalgrowth, directly and/or through the improvement in soil characteristics of the DOM are shown in Table 1. Theproperties (Chen and Aviad, 1990). The so-called ‘‘Alper- methods used for the DOM characterization are describedujo’’ (AL), a very wet, solid by-product from the extraction further down.of olive oil is a good source of DOM because of its high Cand mineral nutrients content (Alburquerque et al., 2004). 2.2. Mycorrhizal inoculation of seedlingsAL, however, also contains organic acids, phenolic com-pounds and fats that may have a negative eﬀect on micro- The mycorrhizal fungi used were either Glomus intrara-bial activity, inhibit the establishment of AM symbioses, dices Schenck and Smith (EEZ 1), or a mixture of G. intra-immobilise available N (Saviozzi et al., 1991) and decrease radices, Glomus deserticola (Trappe, Bloss. and Menge) ´plant growth (Martın et al., 2002; Linares et al., 2003). (EEZ 45) and Glomus mosseae (Nicol and Gerd.) Gerd.Composting with forced aeration and the addition of a bul- and Trappe (EEZ 43). They were obtained from the collec-king agent has been shown to be an eﬀective process with ´ tion of the experimental ﬁeld station of Zaidın, Granada.regard to reducing the phytoxicity of AL (Alburquerque ´ The acronym EEZ refers to Estacion Experimental del Zai-et al., 2006). Little is known, however, of the impact of ´ dın. The mycorrhizal inoculum consisted of a mixture ofthe DOM extracted from properly composted AL on soil rhizosphere soil from trap cultures (Sorghum sp.) contain-native microbial biomass and activity, soil physical proper- ing 55 spores of G. intraradices gÀ1 or a mixture of 24ties or the performance of AM-inoculated plants. spores of G. intraradices, 20 spores of G. deserticola and The objectives of this study were: (1) to compare the 20 spores of G. mosseae gÀ1 together with hyphae andeﬀectiveness of inoculation with an AM fungus or with a mycorrhizal root fragments.mixture of three AM fungi in increasing mycorrhizal colo-nisation, plant growth and nutrient uptake in Medicago 2.3. Experimental design and layoutsativa and (2) to evaluate the potential application ofDOM, obtained by alkaline extraction of composted AL, Five hundred grams of potting substrate, consisting ofin improving the establishment of introduced populations soil and vermiculite at a ratio of 2:1 (v:v) pasteurised byof AM fungi, plant performance and physical and chemical steaming for 1 h on three consecutive days, were placedproperties reﬂecting soil quality and functioning. The in 0.6 l pots. The mesocosm experiment was conducted asresults obtained will determine the usefulness of DOM a completely randomised factorial design with two factors.from AL as a soil amendment and liquid fertiliser for agri- The ﬁrst factor comprised the addition of DOM to soil at acultural purposes. rate of 0, 5.8, 11.7 or 35.1 ml kgÀ1 substrate (0, 50, 100 or 300 mg C kgÀ1 substrate). The second factor had three lev-2. Materials and methods els: non-inoculation, inoculation with G. intraradices or inoculation with a mixture of G. intraradices, G. deserticola2.1. Materials and G. mosseae. Five replicates per treatment were carried out, making a total of 60 pots. An agricultural soil was collected near Murcia (SESpain). The climate is semi-arid Mediterranean with anaverage annual rainfall of 300 mm and a mean annual tem-perature of 19.2 °C. The potential evapotranspiration Table 1 Chemical characteristics of the dissolved organic matter (DOM) ofreaches 1000 mm yÀ1. The main characteristics of the agri- composted alperujo (AL)cultural soil used were: pH (1:5) = 8.89; electrical conductiv- Dry weight (g lÀ1) 25.0ity = 0.18 dS mÀ1; TOC = 1.80%; total N = 2.01 g kgÀ1; pH 12.01available P = 70 lg gÀ1; extractable K = 440 lg gÀ1 and EC (mS cmÀ1) 9.78cationic exchange capacity = 15 cmol kgÀ1. The methods Organic matter (g lÀ1) 17.4used for the soil characterization are described further Extractable C (g lÀ1) 8.6down. Humic acid C (g lÀ1) 6.5 Fulvic acid C (g lÀ1) 2.1 The amendment used (DOM) was the organic fraction Carbohydrates (g lÀ1) 1.03extracted with KOH from composted AL. The raw mate- Phenols (g lÀ1) 1.58rial was collected from an olive-mill located in Granada, Total N (mg lÀ1) 320Spain and mixed with fresh cow bedding as bulking agent Na (mg lÀ1) 186for composting (Cegarra et al., 2006). The composting pro- K (g lÀ1) 4.44 P (mg lÀ1) 62cess was based on the Rutgers strategy (Finstein et al., Ca (mg lÀ1) 1361985) combined with mechanical turning and forced aera- Mg (mg lÀ1) 28.9tion. The extract was obtained by mechanical shaking dur- Fe (mg lÀ1) 3.4ing 24 h (12 h at 25 °C and 12 h at 70 °C) of the composted Cu (mg lÀ1) 0.2AL with 0.1 M KOH (1:20, w/v). The suspension was cen- Mn (mg lÀ1) 0.3 Zn (mg lÀ1) 1.2trifuged at 14644g for 20 min. After centrifugation the

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J. Kohler et al. / Waste Management 28 (2008) 1423–1431 1425 The AM inoculum was mixed with the potting substrate, determined with an automatic elemental microanalyzerat a rate of 5% (v/v). In March 2005, M. sativa seeds were after combustion at 1020 °C. Available P was extractedpartly submerged into the growth substrate (ten seeds per with sodium bicarbonate and determined by colorimetrypot). Three weeks after seeding, the amended pots received according to Kitson and Mellon (1944). Cation exchangethree times 30 ml DOM extracted from AL of each dose of capacity was determined by Ba2+ retention after percola-amendment applied for three consecutive days. The electri- tion with a solution of 0.2 N BaCl2-triethanolamine atcal conductivity of each dose of amendment was 1.26, 2.48 pH 8.1 (Carpena et al., 1972). After digestion in nitric-per-and 6.34 mS cmÀ1, respectively. The pH of each dose of chloric acid, K and Na were determined by ﬂame photom-amendment was 10.75, 10.84 and 10.87, respectively. The etry and Ca, Mg, F, Cu, Mn and Zn by atomic absorptionexperiment was carried out in the nursery of the University spectrophotometry.of Murcia, in Murcia, without chemical fertiliser addition. Microbial biomass C was determined by the fumigation-The plants were well watered and kept outdoors under extraction method (Vance et al., 1987). Ten grams of soil atambient irradiance, temperature and air humidity. 60% of ﬁeld capacity were fumigated in a 125 ml Erlen- During the four months of the experiment (from March meyer ﬂask with puriﬁed CHCl3 for 24 h. After removalto June) the plants were cut three times. The cuttings were of residual CHCl3, 40 ml of 0.5 M K2SO4 solution wasmade two, three and four months after seeding. After the added and the sample was shaken for 1 h before ﬁltrationthird cutting, rhizosphere soil samples were collected from of the mixture. The K2SO4-extracted C was measured asthe pots. To collect the rhizosphere soil the root system indicated for water-soluble C. Microbial biomass C waswith rhizosphere soil adhered was introduced into a plastic calculated as the diﬀerence between the C of fumigatedbag, shook and separated the rhizosphere soil from the and non-fumigated samples divided for the calibration fac-root system. Rhizosphere soil samples, air-dried to 20% tor KEC = 0.38.moisture content and sieved to <2 mm, were divided into Dehydrogenase activity was determined according totwo subsamples. One subsample was stored at 2 °C for Trevors et al. (1982) using 2-p-iodophenyl-3-p-nitro-microbiological analysis and another subsample was phenyl-5-phenyltetrazolium chloride (INT) as oxidizingallowed to dry at room temperature for physical–chemical agent.analysis. Urease and N-a-benzoyl-L-argininamide (BAA) hydro- lyzing activities were determined in 0.1 M phosphate buﬀer2.4. Plant analyses at pH 7; 1 M urea (Tabatabai and Bremner, 1972) and 0.03 M BAA (Ladd and Butler, 1972) were used as sub- Fresh and dry (105 °C, 5 h) mass of shoots and roots strates, respectively. Both activities were measured usingwere recorded. Dry plant samples of shoots were ground colorimetric determination of the NHþ released in the 4before chemical analysis. Plant P was determined colori- hydrolysis reaction (Kandeler and Gerber, 1988).metrically as molybdovanadate phosphoric acid (Kitson Alkaline phosphatase and b-glucosidase activities wereand Mellon, 1944) after digestion in nitric-perchloric acid determined using p-nitrophenyl phosphate disodium and(2:1) for 1 h at 150 °C and 2 h at 210 °C according to p-nitrophenyl-b-D-glucopyranoside as substrates, respec-Abrisqueta and Romero (1969). Plant N was determined tively according to Tabatabai and Bremner (1969).using an EuroVector Elemental Analyser (EuroEA3000), The percentage of stable aggregates was determined bywhereas plant K was estimated by atomic absorption spec- the method described by Lax et al. (1994). Sieved (0.2–trophotometry in the nitric-perchloric extract. The phos- 4 mm) soil (4 g) was placed on a small 0.250 mm sievephorus, nitrogen and potassium contents have been and wetted by spray. After 15 min, the soil was subjectedexpressed on dry shoot biomass basis. to an artiﬁcial rainfall of 150 ml with energy of 270 JmÀ2. The percentage of root length colonized by arbuscular The remaining soil on the sieve was placed in a previouslymycorrhizal fungi was calculated by the gridline intersect weighed capsule (T), dried at 105 °C and weighed (P1).method (Giovannetti and Mosse, 1980) after staining with Then, the soil was soaked in distilled water and, aftertrypan blue (Phillips and Hayman, 1970). 2 h, passed through the same 0.250 mm sieve with the assis- tance of a small stick to break the remaining aggregates.2.5. Soil and amendment analyses The residue remaining on the sieve, which was made up of plant debris and sand particles, was dried at 105 °C Electrical conductivity and pH were measured in a 1:5 and weighed (P2). The percentage of stable aggregates with(w/v) aqueous solution. Water-soluble C (1:5, w/v), regard to the total aggregates was calculated by the follow-extractable C and fulvic acid C (after precipitation of ing relationship (P1 À P2) · 100/(4 À P2 + T).humic acid at pH 2.0) were determined with an automaticCarbon Analyser for liquid samples (Shimadzu TOC- 2.6. Statistical analysis5050 A). Humic acid C was calculated by subtracting thefulvic acid C from extractable C. Phenolic substances were Data were log transformed to achieve normality.measured with the Folin method and carbohydrates by the Amendment addition, mycorrhizal inoculation and theiranthrone method (Brink et al., 1960). Total N and C were interactions eﬀects on measured variables were tested by

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J. Kohler et al. / Waste Management 28 (2008) 1423–1431 1429the highest dose. This result corroborates the suitability of lated negatively with the concentration of soluble Cthis material for agricultural purposes and demonstrates fractions (Muthukumar and Udaiyan, 2000) and with thethe eﬀectiveness of the composting process for eliminating root development, indicating that mycorrhizal fungi actand/or reducing the potentially phytotoxic compounds of as strong sinks for photosynthates. The rhizosphere soilAL (Alburquerque et al., 2006). For example, phenolic of the plants inoculated with the mixture of AM fungicompounds contained in the AL can have toxic eﬀects on showed lower concentration of water-soluble C and rootplant growth (Leadir et al., 1997). Most phenolic acids biomass than those of the control soil. Such a change inbegan to manifest their phytotoxicity to lettuce and soy- the rhizodeposition can aﬀect the composition, activitybean plants at a concentration of 60 mg of phenolic content and size of the rhizosphere soil microﬂora (WambergkgÀ1 soil (Martın et al., 2002). The highest dose of DOM ´ et al., 2003; Alguacil et al., 2005). Both mycorrhizal treat-corresponded to an application of 55 mg kgÀ1 of phenolic ments were eﬀective in increasing microbial biomass Ccompounds and this concentration was not enough to inhi- and benzoyl argininamide-hydrolysing and phosphatasebit the growth of plants. Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi can activities, related to the N and P cycles, respectively.increase the sensitivity of colonised plants to the phytotox- Increased phosphatase activity in the rhizosphere of plantsicity of phenolic compounds, facilitating the action or inoculated with the mixture of AM fungi or G. intraradices ´transfer of these toxic substances to plants (Martın et al., may have been due to a direct fungal secretion or an2002). In our particular case, no negative eﬀect of the induced secretion by the plant roots of extracellular phos-amendment on the colonisation or on the growth of phatases, as pointed out by Joner et al. (2000). In contrast,the AM-inoculated plants was observed. The beneﬁt of the mycorrhizal inoculation treatments led to a decrease incombined treatment (addition of amendment and mycor- b-D-glucosidase activity, which could be related to arhizal inoculation), with respect to the growth of seedlings, decrease of carbon compounds in these treatments as indi-was similar to that from each treatment individually. cated above. Humic substances are known to aﬀect enzymatic activi- Roots and associated mycorrhizal hyphae may form aties of several microbial species (Visser, 1985a) and to stim- three-dimensional network that aggregates small soil parti-ulate microbial growth through alteration of membrane ´ cles (Roldan et al., 1994; Lax et al., 1997). Recent studiespermeability (Visser, 1985b). Dehydrogenase activity is have indicated also that arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi pro-usually measured as an index of microbial activity (Garcıa ´ duce a glycoprotein, glomalin, that acts as an insoluble glueet al., 1997). An increase in the soil dehydrogenase activity to stabilise aggregates (Wright and Anderson, 2000). Thecould be expected due to the input of easily-degradable C mixture of AM fungi was more eﬀective than a single spe-and N substrates from the DOM. However, the enzyme cies at increasing the percentage of stable aggregates of soil.activity was independent of the addition of DOM. This This eﬀect observed in the soil inoculated with the threecould mean that with time (four months after application AM fungi was notably reduced with increasing the doseof DOM) most of the added easily-available organic matter of DOM. The presence of higher contents of sales in thewas decomposed, as is supported by the concentrations of amendment applied could explain the negative interactionlabile C fractions. Consequently, global microbial activity between the dose of DOM and the inoculation with thereturned to its original level in the third harvest. The b-D- mixture of AM fungi. According to such hypothesis, theglucosidase is an exoenzyme that catalyses the hydrolysis lack of changes with DOM rate in the aggregate stabilityof b-glucosides in soil or in decomposing plant residues. of soil inoculated with G. intraradices would be related toThe increase of b-glucosidase activity with the increase of the formation of aggregates more resistant to dispersivethe amendment dose could indicate that the soil achieved eﬀects of the sales from amendment. As suggested bythe capability to utilise the carbohydrate material added Bearden and Petersen (2000), the symbiosis between arbus-with the DOM. Urease and protease act in the hydrolysis cular mycorrhizal fungi and plants would have increasedof organic nitrogen to inorganic nitrogen, the former using the stability of the soil aggregates. In our study, plantsurea-type substrates and the latter simple peptidic sub- inoculated with the two diﬀerent inoculants showed simi-strates. The urease activity decreased proportionally with larly high levels of AM root colonisation. Of particularthe amendment dose, whereas the protease activity was note was the fact that the addition of DOM at concentra-not aﬀected by the addition of DOM. It has been shown tions from 50 to 300 mg C kgÀ1 substrate did not aﬀectthat urease activity is reduced considerably after interac- mycorrhizal infection due to either G. intraradices or thetion of the enzyme with humic acid fractions of low molec- mixture of AM fungi.ular weight (10–20 kDa) at pH 8.0 (Marzadori et al., 2000). In conclusion, the addition of DOM, obtained by alka-Phosphatases catalyse the hydrolysis of organic phospho- line extraction of composted AL, was not suﬃcient torus compounds to inorganic phosphorus. No signiﬁcant restore soil structure and microbial activity and did notvariations occurred with the addition of DOM, which aﬀect the mycorrhizal development of introduced popula-could indicate that the DOM had a scarce content of sub- tions of AM fungi, but, depending on the dose, its fertiliserstrates capable of activating the synthesis of this enzyme. eﬃciency for improving plant growth was apparent. The Several authors have demonstrated that total percent- eﬀectiveness of this amendment with regard to improvingages of mycorrhizal colonisation and sporulation are corre- plant growth depended on its dose. The mycorrhizal